Six lessons from ICAOs carbon market expert group report

The briefing evaluates the Technical Advisory Body's (TAB) assessment of 14 carbon credit programmes for the CORSIA aviation market. It argues that the TAB's findings highlight critical flaws in current carbon markets, specifically regarding the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), double counting, and land-use permanence. Carbon Market Watch uses these findings to recommend stricter standards for the Paris Agreement's Article 6, including the exclusion of pre-2020 credits and land-use credits, the implementation of corresponding adjustments to prevent double counting, and the mandatory inclusion of social and environmental safeguards.

• Carbon Market Watch recommends that only emission reductions occurring after 2020 be used under the Paris Agreement, citing the TAB's decision to only allow offsets from projects that started generating credits after January 1st, 2016, to prevent "excessively old carbon offsets" from being used to offset new pollution.
• The document asserts that double counting of emission reductions cannot be avoided without state-level action and the application of corresponding adjustments, noting that every single programme assessed by the TAB failed the criterion that "emission reductions must only be counted once".
• The Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) is described as technically flawed, failing six criteria—the most of any assessed programme—including all three criteria related to avoiding negative local impacts and sustainable development reporting. Despite this, it was recommended for eligibility, which the author attributes to political protection.
• Land-use credits are deemed unsuitable for carbon offsets due to permanence issues; the TAB's requirement that carbon be stored until 2037 is criticized as inadequate because fossil carbon remains in the atmosphere for over 100 years.
• The TAB established that promoting sustainable development and avoiding negative local impacts are essential components of carbon markets, leading to the limitation of credit supplies for the Climate Action Reserve (CAR) and Voluntary Carbon Standard (VCS) because many of their projects failed to report sustainable development benefits.
• The document recommends that Article 6 rules and bilateral agreements under 6.2 be regularly reviewed, as the TAB limited programme eligibility to the CORSIA pilot phase ending in 2023 to account for the fact that high-quality projects can become non-additional over time.

APA

Carbon Market Watch (2020). Six lessons from ICAOs carbon market expert group report. https://carbonmarketwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Six-lessons-from-ICAO-carbon-market-expert-group-report.pdf

Chicago

Carbon Market Watch. Six lessons from ICAOs carbon market expert group report. 2020. https://carbonmarketwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Six-lessons-from-ICAO-carbon-market-expert-group-report.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Carbon Market Watch |title=Six lessons from ICAOs carbon market expert group report |date=March 2020 |url=https://carbonmarketwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Six-lessons-from-ICAO-carbon-market-expert-group-report.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{carbonmarketwatch2020six, author = {{Carbon Market Watch}}, title = {{Six lessons from ICAOs carbon market expert group report}}, institution = {Carbon Market Watch}, year = {2020}, month = mar, url = {https://carbonmarketwatch.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Six-lessons-from-ICAO-carbon-market-expert-group-report.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }